The heart of physics research revolves around the high speed collision of subatomic particles in so-called "atom smashers" - long subterranean ovals sometime exceeding 30 miles in diameter that spin nuclear matter inside tunnels up to the speed of light.

His death at the age of 94 marks the end of a heroic era for palaeontology, when a single individual working patiently with a pin under the microscope could make discoveries as far-reaching in their way as those revealed by atom smashers.